AIM

MSN

Website URL

ICQ

Yahoo

Jabber

Skype

Location

Interests

HAF Pipe 480 (Spectrum Edition)
This build is a collaboration between Richard Prins from Designs By Richard (myself) and Yorick Smilda (AKA ProAce), for the last 8 months we worked on an LED controller that could do something not possible with other controllers, control addressable LED strips and CoolForce LED fittings together to create a new kind of light show.
After a couple tests and revisions we have a final one made for a project, initially it would have been a build with another manufacturer but due to unavailability we decided to not wait any longer and do a casemod with the controller, we are planning to do more casemods with this controller and we are dubbing the line-up “Project Spectrum” after the initial Project name and builds in the line-up will be known for the “(Spectrum Edition)”
Yorick and myself have been have been planning this for about a month, to get this build started Yorick came over to my house for a couple days to work on the project, help out with the LED work, do some extra coding and much more, together we got pretty far and this first post will show some of the things we did on the build.
Specifications:
Hardware
CPU: Intel 5820K
Motherboard: ASUS Rampage V Extreme (X99)
RAM: Klevv DDR4 Cras White LED 4x4GB (16GB)
GPU's: ASUS GTX 780 DCII (x2)
PSU: Cooler Master V1200
SSD's: Klevv Urbane U610 480GB (x1) and Samsung 850 Series EVO 500GB (x2 Raid 0)
HDD: Western Digital Velociraptor 1TB
Case: Cooler Master HAF X (modded to fit a 480mm radiator and a full lenth PSU cover)
Watercooling
EKWB CSQ Acrylic CPU Block (Polished)
EKWB CSQ GTX 780 Block (x2 Polished)
EKWB D5 Pump Block and D5 pump
Nanoxia CoolForce (16mm) Fittings including LED fittings.
Nanoxia CoolForce 16mm tubing
Nanoxia CoolForce White Pastel
Bitspower Valve fitting
Hardware Labs Black Ice SR1 480mm
Aquatube Reservoir
Others
Corsair SP 120mm (x4)
BitFenix 230mm Pro fan
Swiftech PWN 8 channel fan hub
Nanoxia CoolForce White individually sleeved cables
Custom PSU shroud
Several meters of addressable LED strip.
Custom designed and programmed LED controller
For this new build I took to the attic to pull my old Cooler Master HAF X case out of storage after I had done 2 builds with this case before and I had been using other cases for my workstation, this case has been modified to hold a 480mm radiator in the top which I am using again.
Big thanks to the sponsors for this project.
Klevv sent us their CRAS RAM for a project that ended up being canceled and told me to use it in the next build we would do so here it is, sweet white LED glory to fit in with the RGB lighting (better than red lights of course)
Nanoxia CoolForce has been my trusty supplier for water cooling tubing and fittings, these are the LED fittings we will be using
I'll be using the V1200 which Cooler Master sponsored for a different project, due to the delay that project is going through I told them I would use it in this build.
In the 2015 update build I did with it I had a PSU cover made with mounting points for the pump, HDD and an SSD, on the side it shows my old logo and the casemod name, before it had red acrylic and red LED lighting behind it so we tore it out and replaced it with clear acrylic which has been rough sanded on one side in a single direction (brushed), we then added aluminium tape which gives it a unique look, almost as if it's brushed aluminium, when the lighting is off and when it is on it reflects any light to make sure everything lights up nice and bright.
*We made sure there was no possibility for the tape to come in contact with wiring or any other chance of shorting out the LED work.
A quick test using the rainbow mode to make sure the LED’s all function as they should and it looks amazing, we'll definitly use this mode in the final build.
20170102_195435.mp420170102_195435.mp4 (50MB video, video is also on my Facebook page)
The last time I used this case I noticed the front fan kept hitting the metal it was mounted on so a quick trim solved that.
In the build we will be lighting up several blocks including the GPU blocks, these are two ASUS GTX 780 DCII GPU’s with EKWB CSQ blocks which I sanded and polished to a clear finish together and black backplates, I still had these in my collection and they would fit right in the build.
This is what they looked like in my 2015 update build.
And this is what they looked like with a little test for this build after we added the LED strips and hooked up the controller.
We made a gif! (great to see that format is supported on this forum)
GPU Project Spectrum (HAF Pipe 480).mp4 (30MB file download, video is also on my Facebook page)
We hooked up all the LED strips including the ones in the case and after those 3 days it was time for Yorick to head home after all the work we had done, sadly when I put power on the controller later that day something went wrong and the LED strips (all but the PSU cover strips) got fried, we think it might have been a surge through the controller so Yorick worked on a re-design but until then we can not show the whole system lit up.
There we are after 3 days of hard work in the attic where I work on systems, the table is a mess but it's worth it, we got a lot done but still a lot to do.
The day after Yorick went home I started on to get back to work on the layout for the water cooling loop, a lot of puzzling was done to see what the cleanest look would be.
First test to see if parallel would be the best way to do this loop (spoiler: I went with serial even though this looked pretty nice)
Mounting the CPU block and this time I decided not to go with Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut like the last two times but to once again use Liquid Metal and go with Thermal Grizzly Conductonaut, we are a couple weeks further and temps are looking mighty fine, thanks to Thermal Grizzly for their support
Some piping done after I decided on the layout for the tubing.
After some serious bending of which the photo's seem to have disappeared (dying camera) this was the result, I've filled up the system for testing and since I wanted to use the PC until the final controller and the new LED work is done.
The GPU blocks are not the only water blocks to receive the treatment, I designed this small bracket for the EK CPU block to add some LED's to it, we are going to a place where RGB overkill does not exist!
The left is a Cooler mod we are doing for Cooler Master, the right is the EK CPU block bracket, all parts are designed by me and 3D printed by Yorick.
I might have missed something, it's late but I will add/change anything if I notice it.
The next update shouldn't take long, we received the PCB for the final version of the controller and only have to wait for a few items to be shipped before I can take it apart again and we can install everything as planned.
PS: My apologies for the terrible photo's (some at least), my DSLR was dying at the time and sadly some photo's are missing, I now have a brand new one so the update photo's will all be made with that.